Sarajevo Roses — the city's shell-crater memorials explained
Sarajevo: Guided City Highlights Tour with Sarajevo Tunnel
What are the Sarajevo Roses?
Sarajevo Roses are shell craters left by mortar explosions during the 1992–1996 siege that have been filled with red resin to mark locations where at least three civilians were killed. They appear on pavements and streets throughout the old town and city centre as permanent, weather-resistant memorials.
Walk along Ferhadija, the pedestrian street that connects the old Ottoman bazaar of Baščaršija with the Austro-Hungarian city centre, and you will notice them underfoot: irregular red shapes set into the pavement, looking at first like abstract decorations or old repairs. They are neither.
Each red-filled crater marks a location where at least three civilians were killed by a mortar shell during the Siege of Sarajevo (1992–1996). The craters are real — the impact points of real shells that fell during real shelling — filled with red resin and left in the pavement of the city as permanent, unlabelled memorials. They are called Sarajevo Roses.
The physics of a mortar shell and the shape of the rose
A mortar shell detonating on a concrete surface sends shrapnel outward in all directions, fracturing the surface in a radial pattern. The fracture lines spread from the impact point like the petals of a flower. This is coincidence — physics rather than intention — but it is the coincidence that gives the memorials their name.
The craters were not created as memorials. They were simply there in the pavement after the shelling, repaired in the years after the war with standard materials. At some point, a decision was made to preserve a subset of them — those where the number of deaths exceeded a particular threshold — and to fill them with red resin rather than grey concrete. The result is a set of marks that are simultaneously part of the street surface and apart from it: visible to anyone looking down, invisible to anyone not already looking.
The Markale marketplace massacres
The most significant cluster of Sarajevo Roses in the old town relates to the Markale marketplace, which was shelled twice during the siege.
First Markale massacre, 5 February 1994: A single 120 mm mortar shell landed in the open-air marketplace when it was crowded with people. 68 people were killed and 144 wounded. The ICTY found that the shell was fired from a VRS position and that the attack was deliberate. This massacre triggered NATO’s ultimatum to the VRS to withdraw heavy weapons from around Sarajevo.
Second Markale massacre, 28 August 1995: A second shell landed in the same market, killing 43 people and wounding 75. This attack triggered NATO’s Operation Deliberate Force — the air campaign against VRS positions that, combined with ground operations, brought the war to its end within months.
The Markale market is still functioning today, on Mula Mustafe Bašeskije street — it sells fruit, vegetables, meat and everyday goods. Several Sarajevo Roses in and around the market area mark the sites of these events.
Where to find Sarajevo Roses
The roses are distributed throughout the old town and city centre. The highest concentrations are on:
Ferhadija (the main pedestrian street): several roses on the pavement between the old town and the Catholic Cathedral area.
The Markale area (Mula Mustafe Bašeskije): near the market entrance.
Near the National Library (Vijećnica): the library itself was set ablaze by shells in August 1992 and burned for three days; roses in the surrounding area mark mortar impacts nearby.
Along the Miljacka riverbank: near the crossing points that were among the most exposed during the siege.
Some roses have been lost over decades of road and pavement repairs. Urban renovation has covered a number of them. The remaining ones have no labels, no plaques, no explanation — they require knowledge to read, and a guide to find with any certainty.
Sarajevo: guided city highlights tour with Sarajevo TunnelWalking the roses: a route
A self-guided walk from Baščaršija to the Eternal Flame (Vječna Vatra) along Ferhadija takes about 20 minutes and passes most of the roses in the old town area. The Eternal Flame itself — lit in 1946 to commemorate victims of the Second World War, kept continuously alight through the siege — is at the end of the pedestrian zone and is itself a layered memorial.
For a properly contextualised walk, a war-history tour will locate the roses accurately, explain the specific incidents they mark, and connect them to the broader geography of the siege. Most Sarajevo war-history walking tours pass through this area.
Sarajevo: Bosnian War and fall of Yugoslavia tour with TunnelThe roses in the context of Sarajevo’s war memory
The roses occupy an interesting space in Sarajevo’s landscape of memory. They are not monuments in the conventional sense — there is no bronze, no inscription, no dedicated institution to visit. They are part of the street, embedded in the infrastructure of everyday life, encountered by tourists and locals equally, often without recognition.
This quality — the memorial embedded in the ordinary — reflects something about how Sarajevo has chosen to carry its history. The city has not built a single large memorial site or museum of the siege (the History Museum’s exhibition and the Tunnel of Hope come closest). Instead, the traces of the siege are distributed across the city, visible in pavements, in shrapnel-scarred facades, in the gaps where buildings once stood.
The War Childhood Museum operates differently — it is a formal institution with curated objects and testimonies. The roses, by contrast, are uncurated, informal, embedded. Together they represent two modes of memory: the institutional and the environmental.
For visitors spending time in Sarajevo, spending an hour walking the area between Baščaršija and Ferhadija with the roses in mind — noticing the ones you might have missed, pausing at the Markale market — is one of the most honest ways to take the city’s history seriously without it becoming a performance.
The Sarajevo destination guide covers how to structure two to four days in the city across war history, culture, food and the mountains above. The Bosnia war history itinerary extends the journey to Srebrenica, Konjic and Mostar.
Frequently asked questions about Sarajevo Roses — the city's shell-crater memorials explained
How many Sarajevo Roses are there?
What is the criteria for creating a Sarajevo Rose?
Where can I find the most visible Sarajevo Roses?
Why red?
Are there plaques or labels beside the Sarajevo Roses?
Top experiences
Bookable activities with verified prices and instant confirmation on GetYourGuide.
